***
Sarah gently kissed him awake. The smell of bacon was in the air, along with the enticing aroma of fresh cinnamon rolls. Steve sighed. He loved Sundays. Why was she bouncing on the bed, though? That’s not like her. Maybe it was an earthquake? Semi driving past their house perhaps?
Reality came crashing down on him as he regained consciousness with a pounding headache. He was lying flat on his back in complete darkness. He also appeared to be in some type of cart that creaked and groaned over every rut in the road.
Gingerly he tried moving his arms. Tied. Legs? Tied as well. His eyes? Blindfolded. That explained the constant pressure over them. Was he in this cart by himself? Where were his captors? A soft whisper sounded nearby. Lying perfectly still, pretending to be asleep, he silently eavesdropped on his kidnappers.
“… s’posed to do if he wakes up?”
“The potion will keep him out for a few hours more. Be silent.”
“Can we not give him another dose now?”
“Too much can kill him. He’s too great a prize to risk it.”
His blood boiled. Son of a bitch! Not again! Hell no! Time to get out of this predicament and cause of few of his own.
Focusing all his mental energies, Steve called upon his jhorun for a different type of task: burning something he couldn’t see. Feeling the blindfold around his head, he stretched his neck silently from one side to the other, feeling the straps move slightly on his head.
There. Those straps by his ears. That’d be the perfect place to try.
Okay, Steve thought, addressing his jhorun, you’ve been great so far. Done everything I’ve asked. I have another job for you. I want those straps to burn through. Just the straps.
It only took a couple of moments before he could detect the scent of burnt leather. The pressure over his eyes lessened: the blindfold was loose. A quick jerk of his head had his vision restored. However, he still couldn’t see anything. Damn. Nighttime. How long had he been out, anyway?
His eyes started adjusting to the absence of light, allowing him to see the faint outline of the cart he was laying in. As silently as possible, he twisted so that he could see the ropes binding his arms and legs. Hoping that no one was walking alongside the cart to smell what he was about to do, he focused his jhorun to produce a tiny pinprick of intense fire, and then caressed that red-hot dot along his bonds. His arms were free! Now, his legs. The ropes fell away, neatly sliced open. Making sure there wasn’t any other ropes holding on to him, Steve contemplated his next course of action. Should he just jump out of the cart and yell surprise? Or should he maybe try to sneak out and make a break for it?
At that moment, the cart hit a series of ruts in the road, making quite a racket. Thinking quickly, he silently leapt out of the cart.
“Be careful, dolt! Do ye wish to wake him?”
Steve’s angry voice came floating out of the darkness.
“And if he’s already awake?”
Twin jets of fire illuminated the shocked faces of his captors, catching all by surprise. In that moment of illumination, Steve finally saw who he was dealing with. There were three of them, all dressed in dark tunics and trousers. One was leading the horse and cart, and the others had been picking their way down the mountain path. Down the path? Where the hell was he, anyway?
“Now, do not try anything rash, scum. There is no way ye can take out all three of us before one of us makes it to ye. Just put yer hands above yer head and ye might live through this.”
Steve couldn’t help it. It just came out of him. He laughed.
Nervously eyeing each other, the would-be captors watched helplessly as their victim held up his right hand, still ignited. A large fiery orb appeared. Using the light from his chaser, he observed his attackers. All had swords, but none were drawn. They had instead opted to fit arrows to their bows. And, all three bows simultaneously snapped as they burned to ash. While the startled men looked to one another to figure out what they should do next, Steve’s gaze dropped to the closest man’s scabbard, with his sword still in it. It only took a few seconds before it was glowing solid red. The man howled in pain, scrambling frantically to get the red-hot weapon off his belt. The other two men went through the same ordeal, all howling in pain as their swords literally melted in their scabbards.
“Would you like to rephrase that?” Steve casually asked, tossing the chaser from one hand to the other.
The man that had been holding on to the reins of the horse turned tail and ran, disappearing into the darkness. There was a frantic scrambling in the distance and then they heard a scream of despair as the fleeing mercenary ran right off the edge of the path, plummeting hundreds of feet to the valley floor below.
Eyeing the two nervous men, he hefted the chaser in his right hand. “I like to call this a ‘chaser’,” Steve casually explained. “What is a chaser, you might ask? Let me explain. If I hurl this, it’ll give chase. No matter how fast you run, no matter where you try to hide, it will find its target. And not just one, but both of you. I’ve used them before. Trust me, I have no problem using it again.”
“What do ye want?” The high-pitched voice came out as a nervous squeak.
“Who are you? Who do you work for?”
The two thugs shared a glance, and then both darted away, running as fast as possible. They had to put as much distance as they could between themselves and the fire thrower before he had a chance to react. However, before Steve could throw the chaser, both men discovered the sharp turn on the mountain road that their unfortunate friend had found, and as a result, both ran right off the edge, plunging to their deaths. Echoes of their screams bounced around the canyon walls for several minutes before finally fading away.
Standing in complete shock, Steve’s hands snuffed themselves out. Now what was he supposed to do? His prisoners had fled before he had a chance to figure out where he was, effectively stranding him in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night. He patted the horse on the head.
“I don’t suppose you know how to get us out of here?”
Neighing in fright, the horse took off. The clattering of the receding cart eventually faded away until he was left standing by himself in the darkness.
“This is just great.”
The Prophecy Page 27
